
Hysterical
A Memoir
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Narrated by:
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Elissa Bassist
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By:
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Elissa Bassist
About this listen
Writer Elissa Bassist shares her journey to reclaim her authentic voice in a culture that doesn't listen to women in this medical mystery, cultural criticism, and rallying cry.
Between 2016 and 2018, Elissa Bassist saw over twenty medical professionals for a variety of mysterious ailments. Bassist had what millions of American women had: pain that didn’t make sense to doctors, a body that didn’t make sense to science, a psyche that didn’t make sense to mankind. But then an acupuncturist suggested some of her physical pain could be caged fury finding expression, and that treating her voice would treat the problem. It did.
Growing up, Bassist's family, boyfriends, school, work, and television had the same expectation for a woman’s voice: less is more. She was called dramatic and insane for speaking her mind; she was accused of overreacting and playing victim for having unexplained physical pain; she was ignored or rebuked like women throughout history for using her voice “inappropriately” by expressing sadness or suffering or anger or joy.
Because of this, she said “yes” when she meant “no”; she didn’t tweet #MeToo; and she never spoke without fear of being "too emotional." So, she felt rage, but like a good woman, repressed it. In Hysterical, Bassist explains how girls and women internalize and perpetuate directives about their voice, making it hard to emote or “just speak up” and “burn down the patriarchy.” But her silence hurt more than anything she could ever say. Hysterical is a memoir of a voice lost and found, and a primer on new ways to think about a woman’s voice, where it’s being squashed and where it needs amplification. Bassist breaks her own silences and calls on others to do the same—to unmute their voice, listen to it above all others, and use it again without regret.
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Critic reviews
“Hysterical is staggeringly good. I am speechless, which as a reader, is a rare thing for me. I really just have a bunch of blubbering accolades to shower on Elissa. This is one of the most intelligent, painful, ridiculous, awesome, relevant things I've ever read. I am impressed.”—Roxane Gay
"One of the qualities I appreciated most about Hysterical is the way the author subtly and gracefully links her deeply personal life story to compelling questions about women’s sexuality, literature, history. We never notice her doing the connecting; the larger themes and analysis are seamlessly woven into the intimate story. She makes us think and care about not simply what happened to her, but about women’s bodies, our continued detachment from our own desire, our own complicity in the culture of sexual violence…This artful, moving work of creative nonfiction transcends the self, while keeping us rooted in the most intimate of stories.”—Danzy Senna, bestselling author of Caucasia and judge of the New School Chapbook Competition
“I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE Elissa's writing. That was five loves....Quite a special, strong, funny voice."—Joey Soloway, creator/writer/director/Emmy-award winner of Transparent
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Story
At 15, Elizabeth Gilpin was an honor student, a state-ranked swimmer, and a rising soccer star, but behind closed doors, her undiagnosed depression was wreaking havoc on her life. Growing angrier by the day, she began skipping practices and drinking to excess. At a loss, her parents turned to an educational consultant who suggested Elizabeth be enrolled in a behavioral modification program. That recommendation would change her life forever.
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Insightful, heartbreaking look into abuse of the TTI
- By Queen City Mom on 08-02-21
By: Elizabeth Gilpin
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The Heart of the Woods
- By: Wyl Menmuir
- Narrated by: Wyl Menmuir
- Length: 6 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Throughout history, trees have determined the tools we use, the boats we build, the stories we tell about the world and ourselves, the songs we sing, and some of our most important rituals. As such, our lives are intertwined with those of the trees and woodlands around us. In this journey deep into the woods, Wyl Menmuir travels the length and breadth of Britain and Ireland to meet the people who plant trees, the ecologists who study them, those who shape beautiful objects and tools from wood, and those who use them to help others.
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Perfect for all who love the outdoors!
- By Hannah on 09-10-24
By: Wyl Menmuir
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Uneducated
- A Memoir of Flunking Out, Falling Apart, and Finding My Worth
- By: Christopher Zara
- Narrated by: Christopher Zara
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Boldly honest, wryly funny, and utterly open-hearted, Uneducated is one diploma-less journalist’s map of our growing educational divide and, ultimately, a challenge: in our credential-obsessed world, what is the true value of a college degree? For Christopher Zara, this is the professional minefield he has had to navigate since the day he was kicked out of his New Jersey high school for behavioral problems and never allowed back.
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interesting
- By Leda Adams on 04-28-25
By: Christopher Zara
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The Quiet Room: A Journey out of the Torment of Madness
- By: Lori Schiller, Amanda Bennett
- Narrated by: Brittany Pressley, Gregory Abbey, Cheryl Smith
- Length: 10 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Moving, harrowing, and ultimately uplifting, Lori Schiller's memoir is a classic testimony to the ravages of mental illness and the power of perseverance and courage. At 17, Lori Schiller was the perfect child - the only daughter of an affluent, close-knit family. Six years later she made her first suicide attempt, then wandered the streets of New York City dressed in ragged clothes, tormenting voices crying out in her mind. Lori Schiller had entered the horrifying world of full-blown schizophrenia.
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Mental Health Care in America
- By Dee Garza on 02-29-20
By: Lori Schiller, and others
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In the Blood
- How Two Outsiders Solved a Centuries-Old Medical Mystery and Took On the US Army
- By: Charles Barber
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 7 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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At the 1993 Battle of Mogadishu, dramatized by the popular film Black Hawk Down, the majority of soldiers who died were killed instantly or bled to death before they could reach an operating table. This tragedy reinforced the need for a revolutionary treatment that could transform trauma medicine. So, when Frank Hursey and Bart Gullong—who had no medical or military experience—discovered that a cheap, crushed rock called zeolite had blood‑clotting properties, they brought it to the military's attention. The Marines and the Navy adopted the resulting product, QuikClot, immediately.
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Excellent medical history
- By Anthony on 07-01-23
By: Charles Barber
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RedHanded
- An Exploration of Criminals, Cannibals, Cults, and What Makes a Killer Tick
- By: Suruthi Bala, Hannah Maguire
- Narrated by: Suruthi Bala, Hannah Maguire, Denise Mina
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Based off Hannah Maguire and Suruthi Bala's popular podcast of the same name, RedHanded explores real-life true-crime cases to help answer once and for all if a killer is born or made.
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Deeply investigated, full of light
- By Amy Castenell on 10-08-21
By: Suruthi Bala, and others
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Eat, Poop, Die
- How Animals Make Our World
- By: Joe Roman PhD
- Narrated by: Claire Christie
- Length: 8 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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If forests are the lungs of the planet, then animals migrating across oceans, streams, and mountains—eating, pooping, and dying along the way—are its heart and arteries, pumping nitrogen and phosphorus from deep-sea gorges up to mountain peaks, from the Arctic to the Caribbean. Without this conveyor belt of crucial, life-sustaining nutrients, the world would look very different.
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Excellent!
- By Lee on 07-20-24
By: Joe Roman PhD
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Break to You
- By: Neal Shusterman, Debra Young, Michelle Knowlden
- Narrated by: Elisa Meléndez, JaQwan J. Kelly
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Adriana knows that if she can manage to keep her head down for the next seven months, she might be able to get through her sentence in the Compass juvenile detention center. Thankfully, she’s allowed to keep her journal, where she writes down her most private thoughts when her feelings get too big. Until the day she opens her journal and discovers that her thoughts are no longer so private. Someone has read her writings—and has written back. A boy who lives on the other side of the gender-divided detention center. A boy who sparks a fire in her to write back.
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another wonderful story!
- By Soul LionHeart on 05-13-25
By: Neal Shusterman, and others
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Little Weirds
- By: Jenny Slate
- Narrated by: Jenny Slate
- Length: 4 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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You may "know" Jenny Slate from her Netflix special, Stage Fright, as the creator of Marcel the Shell, or as the star of Obvious Child. But you don't really know Jenny Slate until you get bonked on the head by her absolutely singular writing style. To see the world through Jenny's eyes is to see it as though for the first time, shimmering with strangeness and possibility.
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softness is earned and it is wonderful
- By Van on 12-09-19
By: Jenny Slate
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The Gangs of Zion
- A Black Cop's Crusade in Mormon Country
- By: Ron Stallworth
- Narrated by: Phil Morris
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Determined to pursue his passion for undercover work wherever it led, Stallworth finally lands in Salt Lake City, UT. Once again, he’s an outsider–not only as a Black man on a mostly white police force but also an unapologetic non-believer in a state dominated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. But soon after his first drug bust in the Beehive, Stallworth makes a startling discovery–Bloods and Crips are infiltrating Mormon Country, threatening to turn the deeply conservative community into a hotbed of crime.
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Truth
- By Amazon Customer on 11-08-24
By: Ron Stallworth
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Before We Were Trans
- A New History of Gender
- By: Dr. Kit Heyam Ph.D
- Narrated by: Dr. Kit Heyam Ph.D
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Before We Were Trans illuminates the stories of people across the globe, from antiquity to the present, whose experiences of gender have defied binary categories. Blending historical analysis with sharp cultural criticism, trans historian and activist Kit Heyam offers a new, radically inclusive trans history, chronicling expressions of trans experience that are often overlooked, like gender-nonconforming fashion and wartime stage performance. Heyam looks to the past to uncover new horizons for possible trans futures.
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Educated but skewed 
- By Joshua Ambrose on 11-30-23
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This Is Supposed to Be Fun
- How to Find Joy in Hooking Up, Settling Down, and Everything in Between
- By: Myisha Battle
- Narrated by: Myisha Battle
- Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Swipe. Match. Get ghosted. Repeat. Modern dating can quickly start to feel like an overwhelming slog. It’s easy to forget the point of it all: this is supposed to be fun. Enter professional sex and dating coach Myisha Battle. Drawing on an engaging and diverse collection of client stories, This Is Supposed to Be Fun is a uniquely inclusive, sex-positive guide to help you skip past the games and get what you really want out of dating and relationships—no matter what that may be.
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Guiding the singles
- By Weekend Reader (Lynell) on 04-07-23
By: Myisha Battle
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The Players
- By: Minette Walters
- Narrated by: Emma Gregory
- Length: 14 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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From the author of The Swift and the Harrier comes The Players comes a gripping historical tale of espionage, treason, and surprising alliances set against the backdrop of the Bloody Assizes—the trials that would determine the fate of over one-thousand treasonous rebels.
By: Minette Walters
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The Book of Hours
- Hardcover Edition Features Newly Revised Content
- By: Davis Bunn
- Narrated by: Rose Robinson
- Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Castle Priory is a crumbling Oxfordshire mansion, one Brian Blackstone's wife considered a place of extraordinary enchantment. But for Brian there is no enchantment, only the burden of trying to honor Sarah's dying wish that he hold onto the property. With the local doctor, Cecilia Keeble, Brian begins to explore the mysteries of the old estate. In the process he discovers a medieval secret which offers a key to renew his spirit and heal his broken heart. The power of prayer reaches through the centuries in a surprising and mysterious way.
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Outstanding
- By sewspecialmom on 06-19-24
By: Davis Bunn
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The Self Delusion
- The New Neuroscience of How We Invent—and Reinvent—Our Identities
- By: Gregory Berns
- Narrated by: Byron Wagner
- Length: 8 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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We all know we tell stories about ourselves. But as psychiatrist and neuroscientist Gregory Berns argues in The Self Delusion, we don’t just tell stories; we are the stories. Our self-identities are fleeting phenomena, continually reborn as our conscious minds receive, filter, or act on incoming information from the world and our memories.
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Fun & fascinating facts on shaping oneself
- By Lucy A. Pithecus on 10-24-22
By: Gregory Berns
Hysterical!
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Amazing
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Magnificently Voiced
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Wow and Wow Spelled Backwards!
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Truly Amazing!
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Amazing and much needed!
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Such a needed book!
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So, so, so good!
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I already know this is my favorite book of 2023
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Love a woman’s voice loud and proud!
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